Can you eat oysters in summer?

Yes. It is best to avoid natural oysters, which are often milky; triploids, such as Ostra Regal, are good summer and winter alike.

For two reasons from the past: transport, impossible in hot weather, and the milkiness of oysters in summer.

What is the best season?

There is none: a triploid oyster is as good in July as in December.

Ostra Regal · Seasonality

When to eat oysters? Season, "R months" and milkiness

Can you eat oysters all year round? Yes. The "R months" rule explained, and what has changed.

The "R months" myth

The rule says to eat oysters in the "R" months, from September to April. It dates from before chilled transport, when moving oysters in summer was impossible. Today, oysters are eaten all year round.

The other reason is taste: summer is the oyster's spawning season.

Where the R months rule comes from, and why it no longer applies to every oyster: the full story is in the journal, www.ostraregal.com/journal/calendrier-de-l-huitre

Milky oysters, and those that never are

In summer a natural, or diploid, oyster fills with milt: it turns "milky", with a harsher, more bitter taste, and these are not the oysters people like best. The triploid, or four-season, oyster does not reproduce: it never turns milky and keeps the same flesh all year. Ostra Regal is a triploid oyster.

Same genes, nothing added or modified: what a triploid oyster is, and what it is not, explained in the journal, www.ostraregal.com/journal/huitre-triploide

Questions fréquentes

Can you eat oysters in summer?: Yes. It is best to avoid natural oysters, which are often milky; triploids, such as Ostra Regal, are good summer and winter alike.
Why the R months?: For two reasons from the past: transport, impossible in hot weather, and the milkiness of oysters in summer.
What is the best season?: There is none: a triploid oyster is as good in July as in December.

Order oysters Become a partner The range

Are you ordering together, for a works council or a team? Discover group ordering

→ La gamme de crus Ostra Regal → Foire aux questions → Le journal Ostra Regal → Oysters Cancale → Oysters Saint-Malo → Oysters Paris → Oysters Lyon → Oysters Bordeaux → Oysters Marseille